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Updated: May 9, 2025
The Sheik glowered at the prisoner which his two men brought back to him from the North. He had sent the party after Abdul Kamak, and he was wroth that instead of his erstwhile lieutenant they had sent back a wounded and useless Englishman. Why had they not dispatched him where they had found him? He was some penniless beggar of a trader who had wandered from his own district and became lost.
He had heard of the nature of the Arabs who penetrate thus far to the South, and what he had heard had convinced him that a snake or a panther would as quickly befriend him as one of these villainous renegades from the Northland. When Abdul Kamak had passed out of sight toward the North Baynes resumed his weary march.
Her picture was published in the leading papers of every large city in the world, yet never did we find a man or woman who ever had seen her since the day she mysteriously disappeared. "A week since there came to me in Paris a swarthy Arab, who called himself Abdul Kamak. He said that he had found my daughter and could lead me to her.
But Meriem could but shudder as she recalled the cruelties of this terrible old hag in the years gone by. Among the Arabs who had come in her absence was a tall young fellow of twenty a handsome, sinister looking youth who stared at her in open admiration until The Sheik came and ordered him away, and Abdul Kamak went, scowling. At last, their curiosity satisfied, Meriem was alone.
"I never saw the picture until a couple of days ago, when I found it in the tent of the Swede, Malbihn." Abdul Kamak raised his eyebrows. He turned the picture over and as his eyes fell upon the old newspaper cutting they went wide. He could read French, with difficulty, it is true; but he could read it. He had been to Paris.
"Yes," he said, "I hate the Sheik," and as he spoke he sprang toward the older man, felled him with a blow and dashed on across the village to the line where his horse was picketed, saddled and ready, for Abdul Kamak had been about to ride forth to hunt when he had seen the stranger girl alone by the bushes. Leaping into the saddle Abdul Kamak dashed for the village gates.
Deceived by her silence the man seized her and strained her to him; but Meriem struggled to free herself. "I do not love you," she cried. "Oh, please do not make me hate you. You are the only one who has shown kindness toward me, and I want to like you, but I cannot love you." Abdul Kamak drew himself to his full height.
He almost smiled, nor did he again strike Meriem before he turned and strode away with the parting admonition that she speak never again to any other than Mabunu and himself. And along the caravan trail galloped Abdul Kamak toward the north. As his canoe drifted out of sight and range of the wounded Swede the Hon. Morison sank weakly to its bottom where he lay for long hours in partial stupor.
When he had done he looked at the girl. "You have read this?" he asked. "It is French," she replied, "and I do not read French." Abdul Kamak stood long in silence looking at the girl. She was very beautiful. He desired her, as had many other men who had seen her. At last he dropped to one knee beside her. A wonderful idea had sprung to Abdul Kamak's mind.
Abdul Kamak examined it carefully, comparing it, feature by feature with the girl sitting on the ground looking up into his face. Slowly he nodded his head. "Yes," he said, "it is you, but where was it taken? How does it happen that The Sheik's daughter is clothed in the garments of the unbeliever?" "I do not know," replied Meriem.
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